Memo to Ferguson and St. Louis PD SWAT teams: If you don't want Twitter and Facebook to turn on you pretty much en masse, follow these three simple rules. 1) Calm down; 2) step off the macho military thing; 3) by the way, don't arrest reporters.
The discontent had been simmering for days on social media -- partly because those pictures cropping up on Twitter and (to a lesser extent) Facebook of police in Iraq-style fatigues and Army-style entourages were getting harder and harder to ignore. Difficult questions floated to the surface of the American conscience. Was this police response happening in America, or a Middle East war zone, or 1968, or all of the above?
Simmering, but not boiling over -- yet. It took the arrest of Wesley Lowry and Ryan Reilly, the unlikely duo of outsiders from rival publications who just became the Woodward and Bernstein of Ferguson, Missouri, to spark a nationwide explosion of Tweets.
The outrage following another night of tear gas even prompted a top trending hashtag on Facebook -- which on Wednesday night was doing what it usually does during major news events: lumber along far behind the moment like a slower, larger older brother.
Twitter, to its utmost credit, was bang up to the minute, the best news source bar none. Here's how widely #Ferguson trended on Wednesday night, topping Twitter's national trends for the first time:
@neilhimself @mstohl #ferguson has been official Twitter trend - Worldwide, US, AU, 55 cities https://t.co/8SgmacHj9g pic.twitter.com/8VjJrH8dcf— iTrended.com (@iTrended) August 14, 2014
In case you were wondering, pretty much the entire country is tweeting about #Ferguson pic.twitter.com/i8m4Df5fDU— Satchel Price (@SatchelPrice) August 14, 2014
The reason? Just watch for yourself, moments before Lowery is arrested in a McDonalds where he was recharging his phone and using the Wifi. Police ordered him and other patrons out, for no apparent reason; then when they asked the all important question "why," this interaction happened.
Lowery was arrested at that point -- as was Reilly, whom you can see in the background, also trying to charge his phone. What were they arrested for? We don't know. There is, the reporters discovered when they were released from the holding cell a few hours later, no arrest sheet for their incarceration. Curious, that.
Apparently, in America, in 2014, police can manhandle you, take you into custody, put you in cell & then open the door like it didn't happen— Wesley Lowery (@WesleyLowery) August 14, 2014
Even curiouser:
Didn't realize until just now that I was never informed of my Miranda rights. #Ferguson— Ryan J. Reilly (@ryanjreilly) August 14, 2014
And just like that, the local PD went from pulling a big macho act -- repugnant, overkill, but not inherently illegal -- to two well-documented and widely-distributed cases of apparently wrongful arrest.
Three, if you count local alderman Antonio French -- and you should, because the barriers between media and social media have not just been blurred in the digital age, they've been erased. French's level-headed, just-the-facts Vines and tweets from the ground have helped make him a social media superstar. At time of writing he's being held in jail for 24 hours on a vague and unexplained "unlawful assembly" charge.
Meanwhile, police apparently tried to stop another outlet from documenting them, and got documented themselves in the process. It's like whack-a-mole out there, fellas:
Police fire tear gas near Al Jazeera crew, then disassemble the gear after they flee. #Ferguson pic.twitter.com/UiAiawjlfi— Political Fail Blog (@PFailBlog) August 14, 2014
It's bad enough for the local police force that this kind of response throws into doubt our capacity to trust anything they have to say, whenever they decide to say it, on the extremely questionable death of Michael Brown. It's far worse that social media superstars are being created in their midst. Worse still that the story of these social media superstars is starting to read like a buddy movie in the making.
I mean, the dialogue writes itself:
6 hours ago Ryan Reilly introduced himself to me in a McDonalds. Then we ended up in jail. Wonder what he's got planned for our second date— Wesley Lowery (@WesleyLowery) August 14, 2014
The police also appear to have been successful in cementing a tremendous solidarity among journalists covering the story. Here's the LA Times reporter Matt Pearce helping to free his rivals:
Hey thanks again @mattdpearce! http://t.co/Z6HOcgbqKV pic.twitter.com/u6cZdU3NII— Ryan J. Reilly (@ryanjreilly) August 14, 2014
When the documentarians get together to document your attempt to stop them documenting, it never ends well. Perhaps this is why Missouri governor Jay Nixon belatedly decided to make a milquetoast statement on the whole matter (on Twitter, of course) Thursday night -- he was canceling his state fair appearances and coming to Ferguson.
Canceling all appearances at the @MoStateFair to visit North #STL County tomorrow. Statement to follow.— Governor Jay Nixon (@GovJayNixon) August 14, 2014
Situation in Ferguson does not represent who we are. Must keep the peace, while safeguarding rights of citizens and the press— Governor Jay Nixon (@GovJayNixon) August 14, 2014
Politicians named Nixon should probably be more concerned when officials in their territory start messing with @washingtonpost journalists.— Adam Steinbaugh (@adamsteinbaugh) August 14, 2014
Your move, Ferguson PD. Whatever happens from this point on, know that you have inadvertently created one of the more shareable social media moments of the year -- the pepper spray cop of 2014, only a few hundred times worse.
Wound from a rubber bullet on a friend of @BradleyRayford's: pic.twitter.com/AQzOAWQKuL— jg (@JustinGlawe) August 14, 2014